"The investment will bring social, mobile, and cloud capabilities to HTC's portfolio of service offerings to its mobile enterprise customers," the HTC statement on the purchase says. Does the company want an iCloud rival, perhaps?

Magnet currently offers SalesWIN-- a mobile sales management for Android and iOS devices running on the Magnet cloud platform.

The news comes from an 8K document from AuthenTec, one which at one point (perhaps unsurprisingly) remarks "Authentec cannot comment on Apple's intentions."

Authentec makes fingerprint recognition and NFC chips for mobile device and PC use. It also makes security software-- and recently signed a big contract with Samsung for the use AuthenTecs' QuickSec Mobile VPN Client in new Android devices.

Other AuthenTec customers include Lenovo, Fujitsu and Dell.

What will Apple do with a mobile security firm? Authentec owns around 200 patents covering fingerprint sensors, sensor packaging and software. Not to mention issues involving the security of personal info stored on iDevices and tightening of iTunes and App Store security.

The purchase does raise a simple question-- will Apple follow Google and create its own NFC-based mobile payments system now that it has the means?

Mobility and the bring-your-own-device trend add complexity to the enterprise IT market-- but also add opportunities across sectors as varied as security, unified communications and WLANs, Canalys says.

For example, businesses demand education on mobile device security. To enable a mobile workforce, customers need network monitoring and control, not to mention context-based data access policies. The market lacks a single solution covering protection and control on all fronts, meaning channel partners have a role in advising the best products suiting the needs of individual customers.

Mobility also affects the WLAN market-- as more employees connect mobile devices to wireless corporate networks, the need for secure WLANs able to handle bandwidth-hungry applications drives the market for "significant" capacity upgrades.

Unified communications (UC) vendors also have to extend their offerings to cover all kinds of mobile devices, with no degradation in experience or productivity.

In an increasingly mobile IT environment, it makes sense for channel partners to become increasingly nimble at hunting down the more lucrative opportunities.

The launch of the 3 bundles are the result of Cisco's latest survey on BYOD practices. The company says 95% of survey respondent organisations permit employee-owned devices on the workplace, and 76% describe BYOD as "somewhat or extremely positive."

The survey also predicts the average number of connected devices per employee is set to grow from 2.8 in 2012 to 3.3 by 2014.

Belkin announces an addition to the Mixit DuraTek durable cable line-- a USB-C cable featuring Kevlar-reinforced conductors and double-braided nylon shielding on the outside.
The USB-C cable is certified by both...

Snap-- aka the rebranded Snapchat-- announces the Spectacles, its video-recording sunglasses, are now available in Europe, 7 months after an initial US launch.
For the unfamiliar, the Spectacles are a pair...